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Uncle
Monty.
By
James Roberts
“Had the
pious, teetotalling Montgomery wobbled into SHAEF with a hangover, I could
not have been more astonished… Although I have never reconciled myself
to the venture, I nevertheless freely concede that it was one of the most
imaginative of the war.”
Omar Bradley on
Operation Market Garden.
Northern
France, August 1914, near Le Cateau.
It was still night - the early hours just ahead of dawn. The back
door pushed gently open, and the barrel of a Lee Enfield rifle entered the
Kitchen, swung left to right in inspection of the abandoned room. The dark
figure in a service cap who held that rifle stealthily moved into the
kitchen, then motioned to another behind him. A second dark figure, this
one brandishing a pistol, entered. Covered by the riflemen, the one with
the pistol moved with gentle footsteps through the kitchen, knelt down
beside an interior door, and placed a hand cautiously on the door knob.
With a nod from his comrade, the man with the pistol turned the knob, and
pushed the door wide. Both swung weapons levelled around the open door way
and inspected a deserted café. The rifleman moved into the café, and
after a brief, weapon at the ready, inspection of the room, raised his
rifle barrel towards the ceiling – butt dug in shoulder, finger on
trigger. The pistol man waved, and two new figures with Lee Enfields and
service caps entered the kitchen, and proceeded up the stairs that led
from the Kitchen to the apartment above the café. The pistol man aimed
his weapon at the kitchen ceiling, ready to give any hidden gunmen
overhead an unexpected surprise, if the scouts going up the stairs came
tumbling back down with bullets pursuing them.
No gun shots
came, just the creak of army boots, pacing overhead. The scouts returned,
rifles at trail, and slouched shoulders. “All clear, sir.”
“Very good.
Bring the others in. Quick now.”
Eyes accustomed to the dark of the interior. The man with the
pistol, now being returned to its holster, was an officer, with lean,
angular features, and a serious look in the eye. Those who had served with
him had only occasionally seen that face graced with a smile. Few of the
wretched figures who plodded into the café, looking for a space to
collapse in a heap, had served under him though. They bore the shoulder
titles of a dozen different regiments – Rifle Brigade, Somerset Light
Infantry, Dublin Fusiliers, Seaforth Highlanders. Most of these weary
Tommies, uniforms in rags, did not know this officer just twelve hours
earlier, but already they were getting his measure. They were used to
officers who cared little for the organisation of their commands, and just
left that sort of thing to Sergeants – the ‘gentlemen’ had more
important demands on their time, like hunting foxes and romancing
debutantes. But this officer was different - he was driven.
He wore the shoulder titles of the Royal Warwickshire Regiment, and
like this assortment of squaddies, Bernard Law Montgomery had found
himself cut off and stranded behind enemy lines in the aftermath of the
battle of Le Cateau. Hopelessly surrounded, there was no question of
heroic last stands or honourable surrender in the mind of this officer.
Montgomery had gathered up as many strays as he could find, and set about
ensuring they all lived to fight another day. He had driven this
bedraggled band of the lost and demoralised on a night march, out of the
smoke and confusion of Le Cateau battlefield. Dodging Uhlan patrols,
Montgomery was leading that little band of men around the German lines, so
they could be picked by British or French cavalry patrols, and return to
their own regiments.
Montgomery’s new command was impressed by him, but they were not
warming to him. They were exhausted and their feet had blisters on
blisters. Seeing how tired the men were, Montgomery had decided to risk
entering a seemingly abandoned village, and found a building that looked
suitably deserted for them to hole-up in for a while. He reasoned that at
this point their pursuers would be flagging too, and probably doing the
same as they, namely getting some rest. But Montgomery would want the men
on the move again soon – he had no intention of sitting the war out in a
P.O.W. camp. Military careers were made on the battlefield, and the
gentleman from the Royal Warwickshires was very ambitious.
“BLEED’N
‘ELL! LOOK AT THIS LOT!”, cried a Corporal of the Rifle Brigade, whose
head was inside a cupboard, next to the café counter.
“Keep that noise down, Corporal!” hissed Montgomery. He pushed
aside the soldiers who were crowding around the cupboard, nodding approval
at the discovery. “What have you found?”
The sight of
several shelves of bottled French Brandy answered his question. Montgomery
stiffened.
“Alright
Corporal, get the men bedded down and sentries posted. I want to be out of
here before sunrise, and everyone needs to get some sleep in.”
“Surely, a
drop of Brandy would ‘elp the lads sleep, suh?!” came back the
Corporal, eyes full of optimism.
“That would
be looting, Corporal. It would be different matter if it was food, but not
alcohol!”
Hearts sank
among the squaddies. A Highlander muttered to a Gunner, “I meeta known
it! A bloody absteena!” Montgomery pretended not to hear that.
The Corporal
though was a diplomat. “Oh go on, suh! The lads ‘ave ‘ad a tough
day. A drop Brandy ‘ll be good for morale!”
That touched
Montgomery’s practical streak. Men in goods spirits would march harder.
He did something unusual, and relented.
“Very well,
Corporal. One small glass per man.”
The Brandy was
broken open, and men whispered toasts of appreciation to Montgomery. The
Corporal spotted something he took to be wrong.
“You’ve not
got a glass yourself, suh!”
“No, no. Not
for me.”
Calls of “Oh,
go on, suh”, and “’elp you keep the cold out, suh”, came from all
around. Then the not-quiet-enough whisper of, “I told ye, a bloody
absteena”, in a Glaswegian accent. At that moment Montgomery did
something very unusual, and relented a second time in one day.
“Well, maybe
just one, Corporal.”
Arnhem, The
Netherlands. 30 years later.
The bedroom door was kicked wide, and two captains staggered in carrying
the unconscious, rotund, and snoring deadweight of Major Bernard Law
Montgomery. As had been his habit every evening since the Armistice of
1918, he had drunk himself to sleep. Unsteady steps took his bearers to
the bedside, where they released him onto a cot, which promptly collapsed
under Montgomery’s massive bulk. He did not wake, stir, or even break
rhythm in the barrage of hoarse snores. The two staff officers swayed
visibly, the heavy burden having taken its toll.
“Sod it!
Let’s just leave him,” said one, a wiry young man, surprisingly
youthful for a captain, with a trace of the East Midlands in his accent.
“Let’s at
least get him comfortable, Norris,” replied the other Captain, with a
tone of mild surprise in his voice. “We can’t just leave Uncle Monty
like that.”
Grudgingly, Captain Albert Norris helped Captain Felix Saville arrange
some blankets over Montgomery. To Norris the drunken Major a source of
disbelief, and proof in the young Captain’s critical mind that the
British army valued ineptitude, so long as the incompetent in question was
‘a good chap’. To Saville, and most others in 2nd Army
headquarters, Montgomery was ‘Uncle Monty’, or ‘OC the Drinks
Cabinet’, the grand old man of the officers’ Mess.
“I don’t
understand why the Army still puts up with him?!”,
grumbled Norris.
“I think
those are the reason,” answered Saville, motioning towards the expanse
of ribbons sewed to Monty’s tunic breast. “Mons Star, Military Cross,
Croix de Geurre - he got the first bar on his MC for holding up a platoon
of Stormtroopers single-handed with a Lewis gun in a Jerry counter-attack
at the Somme. They only over-run him because the gun jammed.”
“I heard
he’d downed two bottles of vin rouge at lunch an hour earlier. He was
probably too drunk to walk when the rest of the company retreated, and had
to stay and fight.”
“That’s
codswallop! You should be ashamed of yourself saying such a thing.”
Saville felt a
touch of guilt now, as despite the flurry of indignant anger, he’d heard
the vin rouge account of that action too, and suspected Norris’s
conclusion was probably correct.
Nevertheless, Saville reflected, there was little denying the bravery of
Monty’s exploits in the Great War. The medals were irrelevant. His
actions had the most indisputable endorsement possible – among the
Germans he was a legend. Stories of his alcoholic heroism swept the
Kaiser’s armies over the course of the conflict, growing taller and
gaining embellishment with each new telling. Saxons and Bavarians told
Monty stories like they were favourite beer garden jokes – among
Prussians they were passed on as evidence of the inherit decadence of the
British race. In 1916, one Saxon regiment received a personal letter of
rebuke from the Kaiser when its officers drank a toast to Monty at dinner,
on hearing that he had escaped from a P.O.W. camp after being captured at
the Somme. Besides, Saville told himself, if there was an element of Dutch
courage behind Monty’s exploits, what of it? That was true of many
others with medals.
However, Saville knew Norris had a point to some extent. Even in the
British Army for a regular officer to have only made Major after so long
with the colours, could not be achieved by incompetence alone. Heroic
deeds aside, Monty’s military career had been an unmitigated disaster.
Uncle Monty’s alterative nickname, ‘OC the Drinks Cabinet’, sprang
not just from his love of single malt whisky. No one had the faintest clue
what his actual job was at 2nd Army headquarters. Whatever
tasks had been entrusted to Monty, no one had ever seen him do them – a
Canadian journalist had used Monty’s desk at headquarters since D-Day.
Clearly, no one trusted him with anything, nor was the broken-down Major
Montgomery bothered by this. Norris was right. Monty proved that the Army
never abandoned its lost sheep, no matter how hopelessly far they had
strayed.
Saville had a certain amount of respect for Norris, who he knew to
be very good at his job of intelligence officer. Norris’s briefings were
insightful, and he said what he truly believed. Saville admired him for
that, especially as some of the things Norris had said about Market
Garden, the operation that had just completed, had not been well received.
Norris had strong reservations, as others did but they kept quiet and went
along with the general attitude of “don’t rock the boat”. Norris had
been vocal in his criticism and further upset senior figures, when, as the
operation unfolded, he turned out to be right. Field Marshal Auchinleck,
the commander of 21st Army Group, in consultation with the
commanders of 1st Airborne Army, had come up with a brilliant
and daring plan to snatch Holland from the Germans, and seize a bridgehead
over the Rhine. Auchinleck had been a little too brilliant and daring, and
the Airborne Generals too eager to launch a massive air invasion. The
opposition on the ground in Holland was stronger and better organised than
had been widely supposed, while the Armoured column, XXX Corps, riding to
the rescue of the paratroopers, ran into tough resistance and fell behind
schedule. Meanwhile the Airborne division dropped furthest into occupied
Holland, the US 82nd, had become dangerously split, with the
504th Regiment at the highway bridge in Arnhem. The rest of
the Division had been unable to break through to the bridge and had holed
up in the neighbouring town of Osterbeek. By the time XXX Corps tanks
trundled over Arnhem Bridge, three days late, General Gavin’s command
was holding on by its fingernails.
Rumour had it that the Market Garden plan, which had only narrowly
avoided disaster, should have had further handicaps. The original plan had
British 1st Airborne Division tasked with capturing Arnhem
Bridge, but the commander of 2nd Army, General O’Connor, had
demanded that the US 82nd should have this task. He pointed out
that the 82nd commander, General James Gavin, was an
experienced Airborne general, and the commander of 1st British
Airborne, Roy Urquhart, was new to air landing operations. Also,
O’Connor argued, whoever was at Arnhem had to wait longest for relief,
and therefore by virtue of having riflemen armed with semi-automatic
weapons, a US division had more firepower in ground fighting. Then there
was the issue of drop zones. The air commanders were concerned principally
with avoiding aircraft losses, and had tried to impose drop zones on the
82nd and 101st that were distant from objective
bridges. General Gavin, leveraging his experience of airborne operations
in debate, had dug in his heels and insisted that even if gliders had to
land on a drop zone distant from the bridge, paratroopers from the 504th
should be dropped on polder land immediately to the South and West of
Arnhem. They could race to the bridge, and await the arrival of the rest
of the division, which would land on the air force’s chosen drop zone
East of Arnhem on heath land. This encouraged General Maxwell Taylor of
the 101st to persist in his demands for better drop zones, and
another compromise was agreed, whereby a glider coup de main party would
be dropped at the Son Bridge, North of Eindhoven, to prevent its
demolition.
Market Garden had succeeded, but only just. Norris was unpopular at
2nd Army HQ, because he had been right about so much, in regard
to Market Garden. But his unpopularity pre-dated that operation. There was
a lot about Norris that upset his brother officers. That he had won early
promotion, even though he had entered the Army as a ranker in 1940, grated
with some. For most though, he just wasn’t thought of as ‘one of the
chaps’. He didn’t drink and smoke and chatter in the Mess, his accent
was unfamiliar, he’d come to Army HQ from a County regiment. The Army
liked Guards and Highlander officers, who came from the right families and
the right schools. A man was judged by his skill in the saddle, flair at
the Mess dining table, and prowess in action. To Saville this seemed
terribly unfair. By those criteria, Monty at Norris’s age would have
been considered the better officer, and where was the logic in that?
Saville knew that Norris was not likeable, and in that was his Achilles
heel in terms of a career in the British Army. Norris expected to advance
for his professionalism, but soldiers followed men with dash. Saville
pondered the right balance between a Monty and a Norris. At Ypres, Arras,
and the Hindenberg Line, Monty’s troops would have followed him anywhere
because they wanted to see what he’d do next. His brother officers loved
him, but no one would trust Monty with a job that involved serious
thought. In the absence of war, and as youth deserted him, Monty’s
military career withered. An Army headquarters of men like Norris would be
a mine of breathless efficiency. But unless he could pass for ‘one of
the chaps’, Norris was never going to make General. It was a shame
Norris wasn’t with one of the Imperial divisions, Saville reflected, the
Australians or Canadians would have made better use of him.
The next morning, Saville was entering the building that was
housing General O’Connors headquarters. It was one of the few surviving
buildings surrounding the Northern approach ramp to Arnhem Bridge. Most of
Central Arnhem was now rubble as, unable to shift the 504th
with infantry assaults, 10th SS Panzer Corps had tried to blast
the Americans into submission by destroying the houses they occupied with
heavy guns and tanks. In an entrance lobby, surrounded by German P.O.W.s
busy painting over the smoke blackened walls, was a tall American General,
in animated conversation with a clerk at a desk.
“Corporal,
I’ve come a long way, and I want to see him now. I have matters of great
importance to the war effort to discuss with the Major”, growled the
General, who Saville recognised, and promptly saluted, smartly.
“Good
morning, General, would that be Major Montgomery you’re looking for?”
General Malcolm J. Latham slowly shifted his lined face, and regarded
Saville as Al Capone would have looked on a rooky Chicago cop who had
tried to issue him a parking ticket.
The General did
not deem him deserved of an answer, so Saville continued on his own
initiative. “I’m afraid the Major was taken ill in the night, sir.”
Monty was still hungover. “The
MO has seen him, and says its not serious, but prescribed a day of bed
rest. I’m sorry if this inconveniences you, sir. Perhaps, yourself and
your staff would join us for lunch today?”
Latham
stiffened, and glanced away from Saville, as if the Captain no longer
warranted the honour of even being looked upon. The General then spoke at
(not to) his entourage of embarrassed looking American officers.
“Gentlemen, it seems the British Army could learn a lot from the US
Army, about the importance of officers remaining combat fit, and the
deleterious effects of intoxicating drink.” His staff looked at their
feet, then broke into pursuit as Latham stormed out.
Latham was Montgomery’s opposite number at the headquarters of US
1st Army. Given that no one knew what on earth Monty did, it
was a source of amusement and disbelief that his equivalent post in 1st
Army warranted an officer ranked General with his own staff. This prompted
the officers of 2nd Army to nickname Latham ‘GOC the Drinks
Cabinet’, which when they found out, the officers of 1st Army
thought was absolutely hilarious, for reasons the Limeys had not
considered. Latham’s father, a prominent figure in North Carolina, had
poured a large slice of the family’s considerable fortune into
campaigning for the Volstead Act, and then an even larger slice into
fighting its repeal. The son was nearly as big a bore as the father on the
subject of the demon drink. Later in the war, a Royal Dragoon Guards
officer who was drinking in a bar in Brussels, discovered that the two
American officers who had invited him to join them, were part of
Latham’s ‘staff’. Once drunk both confided that they didn’t know
what the General’s job was in 1st Army either, and were
desperately seeking transfers. “I’d parachute into Tokyo if it meant
getting away from Latham,” grumbled one.
Latham had picked a heck of a day for a liaison visit, thought
Saville, although Latham was probably no more aware of any serious
developments than Monty was. XXX Corps was going to try that day to
breakout of the salient it had established around Arnhem, then drive North
to the Zuyder Zee, cutting off the remaining German troops in Holland.
This would provide 2nd Army with its jumping off point for
pushing East then South, surrounding Germany’s industrial powerhouse,
the Ruhr. This was Auchinleck’s grand design, and Saville had listened
with concern to Norris’s criticisms the previous evening, while Monty,
having drained his own wine glass, had helped himself uninvited to those
of his two younger companions at dinner.
“Guards
Armoured and 43rd Wessex Divisions were heavily engaged at
Normandy, and just before Market Garden they filled up with replacements.
Many of those replacements were anti-aircraft gun crews retrained as
infantry and tank crews, and in most cases that was only half-trained,”
explained Norris. “That’s how XXX Corps started Market Garden.
What’s their strength like now, after five days of tough fighting on the
highway, and further five days of establishing the Arnhem salient?
“Also, bear
in mind XXX Corps has been detaching armoured units to help the 101st
and 1st Airborne division hold open our single highway. Its
weaker now then when it left Belgium in September.
“Then
there’s the logistics nightmare. My God, an entire Corps supplied up one
road!” Norris was clearly struggling to restrain his frustration.
“Well, they
are flying in supplies as well, and the Lowland Division has been flown in
by way of re-enforcements,” replied Saville.
“But that’s
all we have by way of re-enforcements. Early September, Eisenhower’s
offensive was losing momentum, and he had only one strategic reserve left
to call upon, before supply problems brought the whole thing to a halt.
He’s played that card - 1st Airborne Army is on the ground,
now there’s nothing left exploit the gains we’ve made. Auchinleck
needs to pull a magic armoured corps out his hat if he wants to drive into
Germany. He can’t do it with the battered, stretched, and exhausted
forces we have here.”
From around the Mess, Norris’s views were drawing disapproving
looks. Saville found this assessment upsetting too – a lot of men had
died to get XXX Corps to Arnhem – but that which is unpalatable can also
be correct. Judging by the communications that passed over his desk once
the breakout attempt began, Saville was of the opinion that Norris was
proving correct again. The offensive was bogging down, as the Germans had
re-enforced their own lines around Arnhem in the last five days. The
wooded country North of Arnhem had been punched through by XXX Corps, but
at heavy cost. Now they were faced with taking armour across open
countryside, interspersed with villages, and farm buildings. Perfect
hunting ground for well positioned Eighty-Eights. Moreover, 2nd
Army was reverting to form. It had a reputation for cautious advances - a
backlash against the cavalry tactics that had worked so badly early in the
war for the British. The Dutch countryside, so unfavourable for armour,
was bringing out that sense of caution even more so.
Two days later, Norris delivered a situation briefing to Generals
O’Connor, Leese, and Adair.
“Thank you,
Captain. A sober and reasoned discussion, excellent as always,” said
O’Connor, then released a sigh. “I just wish you had some better news
for us.”
“I do too,
sir,” replied Norris, a rare flicker of emotion in his voice. Despite
his criticism, Norris had hoped Market Garden would succeed in ending the
war quickly. Perhaps, that’s why Market Garden happened, people wanted
to believe that a quick end was possible. Norris saluted then left,
returning to his billet smoking a consoling cigarette.
The Generals continued their discussion. Oliver Leese, XXX Corps’s
commander was first to speak.
“Well, from
what we’ve just heard, I don’t see us breaking through to the Zuyder
Zee, let alone driving into Germany.”
“I’ve not
got the strength to do any more than stand on the defensive now,” added
Allan Adair, the commander of Guards Armoured Division.
O’Connor
concurred with his subordinates. “We’re not going to achieve more now.
There are other matters to consider. Antwerp port needs to be opened,
which means clearing the Scheldt. Then there’s mopping up in Holland,
and clearing out those V2 launch sites.”
“I’ve heard
that Patton is hopping mad Eisenhower switched supplies to 2nd
Army, while his boys are running out of petrol,” said Leese.
“You’ve
heard right,” replied O’Connor. Ever the diplomat, he added, “We’d
better mend some fences there.” The General turned to his secretary,
“Peters, go get Uncle Monty.”
A few minutes
later, Major Montgomery waddled in, looking taken aback at the
distinguished company.
“Monty,”
asked O’Connor, “have we got anything particularly notable in the
drinks cabinet at the moment? Say, a good single malt whisky?”
Monty went into
deep thought, scratching his flabby chin, “well, there’s a 20-year-old
Oban I’ve been keeping back for when we win, sir…”
“That sounds
ideal. Monty, get that sent around to General Patton, with my
compliments.”
Monty’s jaw
swung open, and eyes saucered. “You must joking, sir! You can’t give
the Oban to a Yank!”
“Send it with
my compliments, Monty.”
Monty shuffled
to attention, gave an awkward salute, turned and left. O’Connor caught a
momentary sparkle of defiance in the Major’s eyes.
“The Oban,
Monty! SEND HIM THE OBAN!”, O’Connor called after Monty’s receding
footsteps, but without a word of acknowledgement in return. The General
sighed heavily. Patton would not be getting the Oban, but O’Connor knew
that even Monty’s idea of a second rate whisky would be something rather
impressive.
“My men can
eat their belts, but my tanks have gotta have gas.”
George S.
Patton |
